Leadership competencies of successful business leaders in South Africa

Abstract:

With the advent of democracy, South African business leaders are confronted
with numerous challenges like globalisation, cultural diversity, Black economic
empowerment, transformation etc; that require innovative thinking, re-engineered
approaches and improved competencies.
This study focused on the leadership competencies required of South African
business leaders within the financial services industry to deal effectively with
these challenges and explored how the developmental needs of business
leaders should be addressed.
Contrary to initial predictions, transactional leadership was still prevalent within
the industry and both White and Black executives continued to advocate and
practice these competencies. However, corporate and individual strategies have
been re-defined to incorporate transformational leadership competencies. This
has required executives to modify their operating styles and leadership
behaviours.
With regard to servant leadership, legislation has required business leaders to
focus on their interaction with employees, economic welfare and to increase
social contribution. However the overall conclusion is that while banks are
becoming “caring organisations” the primary focus will still be on shareholders.
This business model is unlikely to change under the present capitalist and
market driven economic systems.
The application of African leadership competencies was a contradiction in
practice. White executives were of the impression that their organisations had
adopted African leadership competencies, but Black business leaders were more
sceptical about its adoption. The core reason was that White executives did not
necessarily fully understand these values, while Black executives were not
represented in sufficient numbers to implement these values in practice.
Leaders are further required to concentrate on their EQ maturity, as this will
empower them to become more self-conscious, learn from experience and
interpret the behaviour of others.
The study concluded that for business leaders to be successful in the longer
term they would need to display, advocate and practice the competencies of
charisma, intellectual stimulation, inspiration and transformation, in conjunction
with an appreciation of cultural diversity and Ubuntu. The most fundamental
variable that proved successful for leaders was that they exhibited time for their
people.